


the wounds are fresh and bleeding

by elumish



Series: Grace to Your Children [2]
Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alive Hale Family, Alternate Universe - Werewolves Are Known, Character Death, Gen, Implied/Referenced Underage, Mentioned Kate Argent/Derek Hale, The Hale Fire
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-13
Updated: 2017-11-16
Packaged: 2019-02-01 19:57:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 12,045
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12711894
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elumish/pseuds/elumish
Summary: “You’re not a dog, are you?” The puppy shakes its head, which isn’t something a puppy does, he doesn’t think. “Are you a werewolf?” It woofs softly. “Are you a Hale?”





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is an AU to my main TW AU, [Werewolves 101](https://archiveofourown.org/series/309960).

Stiles likes the forest. It’s dark, but he has a flashlight that his dad gave him in case he ever had to hide somewhere dark or if the power went out or if something else happened and he needed it, and he has his Spiderman comic, and he doesn’t want to be in his house because his mom can’t remember him and it makes her sad and scared and he doesn’t want to do that so he’s in the forest because then she won’t have to see him and not know.

And it’s not like he hasn’t spent lots of time in the forest, because he likes dirt and trees and worms and there are werewolves there but he’s never seen a werewolf because nobody’s allowed there during the full moon and he would sneak out with Scott but Scott has asthma and that would be bad because Scott can’t run away not that you’re supposed to run away from werewolves when they’re being werewolfy because then they might chase and bite and if they bite unless they’re Mrs. Hale then you’ll just bleed and die and it’ll be bad.

His dad told him that. His mom told him that too, but that was a long time ago. She also told him not to be scared of the werewolves because they’re nice people when they’re not being all grr-y. Grr-y means be still, not grr-y means be nice.

He finds a log to sit on, which is kind of gross because it’s wet and there’s green moss—mold?—on it, but he has his flashlight and his Spiderman and it’s only a little cold and it’s not too bad. And he’ll go back home in the morning before anyone is awake and nobody will notice that he’s not there.

He reads for a while, even though it’s slow because he keeps getting distracted. It’s hard to concentrate, sometimes, and then he has to keep rereading the same things because he forgets what he read or if he read it and then he goes back but it’s okay because he likes Spiderman and if he reads it twice then it’s just twice as much Spiderman.

But then there’s light in the distance, and the sound of shouting, and he puts Spiderman in his backpack that he’s carrying to carry Spiderman and he points the flashlight towards the light because there’s not enough light to see the ground and he starts running towards it because it’s orange and orange means fire and fire is bad in the forest and he’s probably supposed to run away from fire in the forest but he needs to see if it’s something he can put out because if it is then he’ll put it out because otherwise the whole forest will be on fire and then it might hit houses and then people would die.

But when he sees the fire it’s not from trees but from a house and he’s seen pictures of that house because it’s the Hale house and it’s bad when houses are on fire and so he starts running towards it but then there are people there, people outside the fire, and they’re laughing, and they’re not supposed to be laughing because it’s on fire.

“There’s a fire,” he shouts at them, because maybe they’re blind and so they don’t know that it’s on fire, and one of them turns and looks at him and says something that his dad said on the phone once and then told him not to say because it’s a thing you’re not allowed to say. And he thinks that maybe they’re not blind and they know there’s a fire and they’re bad, especially because one of them points a gun at him.

Stiles knows what a gun is because his dad has a gun and his dad showed him the gun and said that this is a gun and you shouldn’t touch it because it’s like those words where only adults are allowed to have it and only sometimes and only if they’re good and Stiles could hurt someone if he touches it and he doesn’t want to touch it because he doesn’t want to hurt anyone.

And the fire is really hot next to him and there’s smoke and he’s coughing, but there’s also a gun and if he runs away then the guy can hurt him with the gun because guns can shoot really far because he looked up guns in the Encyclopedia Britannica under G, except his mom said that it was also under F and that was confusing so he runs towards the person instead and the person says another one of the words you’re not supposed to say and then Stiles runs into them and they fall over and the gun goes off and there’s a loud noise and Stiles can’t hear out of one of his ears but he pushes the gun away because this person isn’t good and so his dad wouldn’t let him have a gun but his dad’s not here so Stiles has to do it.

And the guy tries to grab him but Stiles is fast because sometimes Jackson tries to beat up Scott and Stiles has to be fast enough for both of them because Scott can’t always be fast because he can’t breathe right and Stiles looked that up in the encyclopedia too.

The house is screaming or maybe there are people in the house, and so Stiles runs towards the house and there is a muffled noise like the gun noise again but he can’t hear right but it doesn’t hit him, and he pulls open the door and screams because the doorknob is like fire.

And there are people inside, but they’re not moving, and Stiles is coughing and maybe it’s the dust so he kicks some of the dust away and then they’re moving and one of them picks him up and another one roars and Stiles knows you’re supposed to be still when werewolves are grr-y so he goes still and people are saying something and he’s coughing and his hands hurt and he’s crying.

There are more loud gun noises and the person holding him falls over and he tucks and rolls like he learned to do on couches. And then Stiles sees a lady with a gun and there is a gun near Stiles and it is from the man who Stiles ran into and he saw pictures of how to use a gun and he’s not allowed to use a gun but the lady is bad and she shouldn’t be allowed to use a gun either and so he picks up the gun and pulls the trigger and his hands hurt and he’s crying and the lady falls over and it’s hot and Stiles is scared and he doesn’t know what to do so he stands up and runs over to the trees and curls up against a tree on the ground and cries.

Things happen for a while, and there are lots of people and howling and yellow eyes and red and one set of blue and blue is bad he thinks but he’s not sure and they’re all blurry anyway so maybe he imagined it. He doesn’t want to move, even though his hands hurt, because things are scary and the forest isn’t going to catch on fire so he can stay in the forest and it won’t catch fire.

Police people come and EMTs and there are lights and people are running around and he doesn’t see his dad and he doesn’t know why he doesn’t see his dad and he wants to go ask but he knows he’s not supposed to be there because he’s not supposed to go to the forest at night so he doesn’t go over.

Instead, he looks at his hands. He only touched the doorknob with one of his hands, and that one looks like black and red and pain and terrifying, but the other one has splinters and blood and he doesn’t know where his flashlight is but he still has his backpack and he pulls it into his lap and curls up around it and tries not to touch anything with his hands.

The fire goes out finally, and the house is still there, only black-ish, and it starts to get light, and he’s not crying anymore but he both can’t feel his hands and can feel them too much. But it’s light enough that he can walk back home, so he stands up and puts his backpack back on his back and starts walking. And he’s slower this time, and he thinks he’s dripping blood, and he starts crying again because his leg hurts and he doesn’t remember hurting it and he’s hungry and thirsty and needs to pee but he’ll do that when he gets home.

But when he gets home, there are more police people there and ambulances and caution tape and reporters, and he doesn’t know what’s going on so he pushes through, and he’s bleeding and scared and his heart is beating really fast and he can’t breathe and he’s shouting for his dad and his mom, over and over, and then one of the people who works with his dad grabs him and tucks him against their chest and starts saying things, over and over, and he doesn’t know what they’re saying and everything hurts and he just wants his mom and dad.

\--

They bring him to the hospital and won’t tell him where his parents are and someone bandages his hand and lets him go pee and then they sit him in a hospital room with police people outside.

He doesn’t want to just sit there, and he’s tired from not sleeping but he doesn’t want to sleep without knowing what happened to his mom and dad so he starts walking around in circles around the hospital room. He does that for a while, even though his leg hurts, and then the door is pushed open and a puppy walks in. He crouches down in front of it, and it pads over to him slowly. His hands hurt, but he scratches it behind the ears with his less-hurt hand.

The puppy doesn’t move except to breathe on him, so he says, “You’re not a dog, are you?” The puppy shakes its head, which isn’t something a puppy does, he doesn’t think. “Are you a werewolf?” It woofs softly. “Are you a Hale?” There’s another woof.

Stiles doesn’t want to get up, so he sits down on the floor and the puppy sits in his lap, except it’s not a puppy, it’s a werewolf, and it’s big, but he always thinks of dogs as puppies and wolves as puppies and so it’s a puppy. “Is your family okay? There was a fire and I tried to make there not be a fire and the people had guns and I didn’t know what to do and I don’t know if I fixed it and I’m sorry.”

The puppy woofs again and then drops down on him and starts growling and it vibrates through him and he starts vibrating too and he doesn’t want to get up because there’s a puppy on him and he’s tired and his hands hurt and he curls up around the puppy and falls asleep.

He’s in a hospital bed when he wakes up, and Scott’s mom is on one side of him and Mrs. Hale is on the other side and they both look sad and he wants his mom and his dad.

Scott’s mom touches his shoulder and asks, “How are you feeling?”

“Where are my mom and dad?”

She touches her mouth then sits down in the chair next to the bed. She moves like she’s going to grab one of Stiles’s hands, then stops. “I’m sorry, Stiles.”

“What are you—what do you mean?” He tries to sit up but Scott’s mom pushes down a little on his shoulder and he stops moving.

“Both of them were killed last night.”

That doesn’t make any sense. That doesn’t—his dad has a gun and is good at shooting people and wouldn’t let anybody hurt his mom. His dad is _invincible._ He can’t—that doesn’t—

“Stiles.” Scott’s mom stands and leans over him, putting hands on either side of his face. Things go darker. “Stiles, I need you to breathe for me. I know it’s scary right now, and it hurts, but what I want you to do is just breathe right now.”

“How—how did they—”

“Someone shot both of them.” She brushes hair out of his face. “Stiles, Mrs. Hale wants to talk to you. Are you okay with that?”

Stiles nods, and Scott’s mom moves back so Stiles can see Mrs. Hale. “Is your family okay? There were fires and guns and I tried to stop it but I don’t know if I did and there was a werewolf in here but they were a puppy and so I couldn’t tell what they were saying.”

Mrs. Hale smiles at him. “My family is fine, thank you. Thanks to you. Did you know that I knew your parents?”

Stiles shakes his head, then stops. They talked about Mrs. Hale a few times. He nods. “I think so.”

“Well I did, and you met my daughter Laura earlier. She was the…puppy. What your parents probably didn’t tell you is that they spoke to me about taking you in if anything happened to them. I know you don’t know me or my family that well, and that the idea is probably scary because much of my family is werewolves.”

Stiles shakes his head. “My mom said that werewolves aren’t scary unless they’re being all…werewolfy, and if they are you’re just not supposed to run away because then they’ll think you’re prey and chase you and bite you and you might die. And Laura was nice when she was a puppy and she just sat on me and was warm.”

“Your mother was a very smart woman.”

“And then she started forgetting everyone.”

Mrs. Hale’s eyes narrow, and then she smiles. “Would you be okay with living with me and my family, Stiles? It’s in your parents’ will, but if you don’t want to live with us, we can find you somewhere else to live. We would understand.”

Stiles shrugs. “I’m not scared of you.”

“That’s because you’re really brave, Stiles. Some of my kids want to meet you because you’ll be living with us. Are you feeling up for that?”

Stiles doesn’t know what he’s feeling, other than that his hands hurt, so he shrugs. “Okay.”

“They’ll probably climb all over you. You can just kick them out or yell at them if you want them to leave you alone.” She looks at the door, then says, “Derek, Laura, come in, please.”

The door opens and a man and a woman—or teenagers, maybe, he thinks, but he’s not sure—walk in. The man is tall, taller, but Stiles thinks he’s younger. Stiles doesn’t know. He’s not sure what he knows. His hands really hurt. He lifts his hand that hurts less and waves. “Hi. I’m Stiles.”

The woman walks over to him and sits down on the edge of the bed. She beams at him. “I met you earlier, though I was a bit…fluffier then. I’m Laura. And you’re going to be living with us, right? I always wanted another younger brother.”

“Because you’re so nice to the one you have,” the man says, and he walks over to the end of the bed, sitting cross-legged on it. He puts his hand on Stiles’s ankle through the thin sheet, and his hand is hot. “I’m Derek.”

Stiles waves at him, the winces when his hand hurts. Derek pulls up the sheet and puts his hand on Stiles’s bare ankle. The pain fades from his hands. “How did you do that?”

Mrs. Hale smiles at him, putting a hand on the back of Derek’s neck. Derek looks over at her, looking like his dad does when his mom finds the laundry still in the dryer because his dad forgot to take it out. “It’s a gift that werewolves have, one that they’re not supposed to use in public.”

“Sorry, mom.”

Scott’s mom says, “I’ll just pretend I’m not here. I’m going to want to change your bandages soon, and I thought it would be best if I stayed here for the moment, so I’ll just sit in the corner.”

Mrs. Hale nods. “Thank you for this, Melissa.”

“Of course.” Scott’s mom walks over and sits down in a chair in the corner of the room.

The woman touches Stiles’s cheek, and it feels weird, and he squirms away. She pokes him, and Mrs. Hale says, “ _Laura_.”

“Sorry.” She smiles at him. “You saved us last night. You, little you, by yourself, you saved us. You’re a good little kid.”

Stiles doesn’t know what to say to that, so he just flails his hands. “There was a fire and dad said fire in the forest is bad and I just didn’t want there to be fire in the forest and bad people had guns and I didn’t know what to do and I think I shot someone. Did I shoot someone?”

Scott’s mom stands up. “Okay, I think that’s enough of this right now.”

Stiles looks over at her. “Did I shoot someone? I’m not supposed to shoot anyone. Dad told me I’m not supposed to touch guns because I could hurt someone and I don’t want to hurt someone and I’m sorry.”

Laura shrugs. “If it makes you feel any better, she was trying to kill all of us.”

“ _Laura_ ,” Mrs. Hale says again, and she sounds like Stiles’s mom, or like she used to sound, and to Stiles’s horror he starts crying again, and Derek makes an alarmed noise and Laura gives him a hug and he starts crying even harder.


	2. Chapter 2

Stiles doesn’t sleep any more, but they give him some pain medication and so things go fuzzy for a while, and when they get un-fuzzy Laura is sitting in a chair next to the bed, knitting what looks like an entire blanket but with super thin knitting needles that he feels like she could poke someone’s eyes out with, and she looks up at him and smiles. “How are you feeling?”

Stiles wiggles his hands, both as an answer and to see if his hands hurt, and they do hurt, which, ow. It’s weird that one hurts more than the other, and he feels like they should both hurt the same much, so he pokes the less hurty one and then it hurts more. But they’re different hurts, too, so that doesn’t help.

Laura puts down her knitting needles, taking one of his hands in hers. “Do you want me to take the pain away? I don’t—humans heal so slowly, and I don’t know how it works, but I just—you’re in pain.”

Stiles shakes his head. He wants to keep the pain. The pain feels important.

He wants his parents, but he can’t have his parents. He knows he can’t have his parents. He wants his parents so much.

“Where’s your mom?”

She straightens in her chair. “She’s in the ICU with Uncle Peter because they’re afraid of moving him out of the hospital to one with a burn center, but I can get her if you need. Do you need her?”

She’s with a hurt person, and he hadn’t even realized someone was hurt, and he feels bad, so he shakes his head. “I’m fine. Who—who got hurt? Other than your Uncle Peter? Did anyone else get hurt?” Maybe if he had been faster nobody would be hurt.

Laura reaches out and touches his cheek, and it feels weird but he doesn’t move away because she doesn’t feel like his mom because her hands are rougher than his mom’s. “Oh, Stiles. You don’t have to worry about that right now.”

“Can you tell me anyway? I want to know.” Because if he doesn’t know then he’ll think, and he’ll think about all of the terrible things that could have happened and how many people could have died and he should have been faster and he doesn’t know why his parents are dead and he doesn’t want to think about it but what if that’s his fault too?

“Okay, okay.” She looks around like she’s looking for someone or wants someone else to be there, and then she says, “So Uncle Peter is the worst hurt, because a lot of him got burned. And that’s not your fault, it’s not your fault at all. Dad got a wolfsbane bullet through his shoulder but we got to it in time, so he’s fine. And Mia and Alain and Ry all had smoke inhalation issues because they’re human, and Ry ended up with some burns too. Mostly on his arms, defending Mia. Everyone else is fine, though. You got more hurt than almost anyone else.”

That’s good. They shouldn’t be hurt. Everyone loves the Hales. They would be sad if they were hurt. “Is Derek okay?” He was there last time but he’s not there now, and Laura didn’t say he was with their Uncle Peter.

Laura makes a face. “Derek is…sad right now, because people got hurt and because of things that I can’t explain to you—not because of you but because it’s Derek’s thing.” Stiles nods. He understands when something is your thing and you don’t want to share it with other people, like how he doesn’t like to share Scott with other people because Scott is his. Though he might need to share Scott with the Hales now because he’s going to be living with the Hales, and he doesn’t know how he’s going to do that, but he will.

“Can I make Derek less sad?”

Laura looks sad too. “Oh, Stiles, you don’t need to worry about that. We’re all a pack, and that’s the sort of thing that packs figure out together.”

Stiles pokes at his hand again, not looking at her. “Will I be in your pack, too?”

“That’s something that my mom and my dad will talk to you about in a little bit. I’ll be the alpha when I’m older—a lot older—but my mom is the alpha right now, so talking about pack stuff is her job.” She seems to think of something, because she looks off to the side and frowns a little. But then she smiles. “My mom is a politician, and she’s kind of important, and so there’s going to be lots of press and stuff around, but if you don’t want to deal with them we can protect you from them. If you want.”

Stiles blinks at her. He thinks he missed something. That happens sometimes, when he’s thinking about something else and someone says something but too much of his brain was on the other thing, but he doesn’t think he was thinking about anything else too hard this time. “Why would they care about me?”

Laura looks surprised. “Because you saved us.”

“Oh.” Stiles had kind of forgotten that. He feels kind of stupid. “I mean, you could have gotten out on your own.” He doesn’t want to think about the gun and the lady because they haven’t yelled at him for that but he knows he did something bad.

“No, we couldn’t have.” She looks around again then asks, “How much do you know about mountain ash?” Stiles feels like he should have read about that in the encyclopedia, but he doesn’t think he did, so he shakes his head. “Mountain ash…mountain ash keeps werewolves from going places, when it’s around them.”

“Why?”

“Because—actually, I don’t know. But it does.”

“That doesn’t make any sense.”

She laughs. “Yeah, well, it’s true. Unfortunately. So our house was lined with mountain ash, and you broke the line, so we could get out.”

Stiles blinks at her. “Why was your house lined with mountain ash if it keeps you from going places?”

“We didn’t put it there.”

“Oh.” That makes more sense. “Is there food?”

“Oh, yeah, of course.” She stands up, putting the blanket in the bag next to her. “I’ll go get something for you. And my mom or my dad or someone. Someone adult.”

“You’re adult.”

She laughs. “No, I’m really not.”

\--

Stiles thinks he’s going to get more answers while he’s in the hospital, but Laura comes back with food and no people and Scott’s mom doesn’t want to tell him things and one of his dad’s work people comes in and pats him on the shoulder and says sorry and says that they’re keeping watch outside and that if he needs anything he can go ask and Stiles wants to ask for his dad back but he knows that’s not possible so he just nods.

Stiles is allowed to leave the hospital the next day, and for some stupid reason he thinks they’re going to his house, so he’s surprised when they turn into the Preserve. Surprised enough to blurt out, “I thought your house burned down.”

He’s sitting in the back squished between Derek and Laura, and Laura laughs at that. It’s not a mean laugh, though, more like an entertained laugh. “We have a lot of people to work on it, and a strong motivation to fix it quickly. And it wasn’t that bad, mostly thanks to you.”

Stiles nods. “Is there—is everyone going to be there? I don’t know—I don’t know all of you.” He looks at his bandaged hands. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to be doing.” Derek puts his hand in Stiles’s hair, and Stiles looks over at him. “You guys touch a lot. Is that a werewolf thing? I guess I need to learn werewolf things now.”

Mrs. Hale looks at him in the rearview mirror. “My brother Peter is still in the hospital, and Laura and Derek’s dad is there with him. Because he’s a werewolf, it’s important to have another werewolf with him until he’s a little more healed because he could be dangerous like this. That’s something we’ll have to teach you about before he comes home, because you’re a little bit more breakable as a human, and sometimes werewolves when they’re in pain don’t know how strong they’re being. Do you understand that?”

Stiles nods. “It’s like when Scott’s having an asthma attack and sometimes he holds my hand too hard and it hurts.”

“It’s a little bit like that, yes, except if a werewolf holds your hand too hard they could break your bones. Cora’s also with him. I’ll introduce you to everyone who’s around, and if you want to stop at any point or you need to walk away, you can just let me know. Okay?”

“Okay.” Stiles chews on his thumbnail for a minute, then asks, “If you have humans, why couldn’t they get through the lines? If the lines just stop werewolves?”

Derek’s hand closes a little in his hair, then releases it. Mrs. Hale says, “They were all sleeping, and the smoke hurt them.” She looks back at Laura. “If anyone from the Pack Alliance calls, let me know immediately, and do not mention anything to Deucalion or anyone else.”

Laura nods. “Can I give an update on Uncle Peter if he asks?”

“You can give an update on Uncle Peter and Dad, but otherwise give the phone to me.”

“Okay.”

They pull up to the house, and it looks burned but it doesn’t look as bad as Stiles thought but Stiles only knows burned houses from TV shows he’s not supposed to watch about cold cases so maybe they don’t all look that bad.

There are people working on the house, and some of them look like Hales and some of them don’t, and they all turn to look when the car drives up, and one of them jogs over the car. He gets there when the doors are opening and Laura is getting out and Derek is getting out and Stiles is thinking about getting out.

Laura throws her arms around him, crying, “Ry!”

The guy hugs her back with one arm, moving the other arm a little bit gingerly to touch her shoulder. “I love you,” he says, and his voice sounds like Stiles’s dad’s friend who smoked a lot. “How’s dad?”

“Mom spent more time with Uncle Peter than I did, but he’s…alive.”

“Okay.” He pulls away from Laura and peers into the car at Stiles. “Is this the kid?”

“Yeah.” Laura looks in the car at Stiles, who’s still debating whether or not he wants to get out. He’s leaning towards not. Sitting in the car for forever seems like a good idea. Because this guy has a dad too, and Laura and Derek have a dad and a mom, and Stiles doesn’t have any of them, and he can’t take their mom and dad, and he doesn’t know what to do. “This is Stiles.”

The guy stares at him for a minute, then sits down in the car next to Stiles. Stiles moves out of the way a little, towards where Derek had been sitting. “Hi,” the guy says. “I’m Ry. I’m human too, if you’re a little intimidated by all the werewolves.”

Stiles shakes his head. “I’m sorry I didn’t help your dad fast enough and he got hurt.”

“Oh, kid, no. My dad got hurt, but he got hurt helping us get out. The human members of the pack, I mean. That’s why he got hurt. You saved our family. There’s a—” He looks at Mrs. Hale outside the car window where she’s talking to Derek. “There’s a thing in packs where one of the best things you can do is give something to the pack or do something for the pack. When people bring in mates from outside the pack, having one that can contribute something or has contributed is really important. So what you’ve done for us is—you’re the only reason I’m alive right now. You’re the only reason most of us are alive right now.”

Stiles doesn’t know how to deal with this right now, because he just—he just opened a door and—the gun—and his parents—

“Okay.” Ry turns and looks back at Laura. “Laura, I don’t—”

“Yeah, I got this.” She walks around to the side of the car where Stiles is, crouching down next to Stiles. “Hey, Stiles.” Stiles tries to turn and look at her, but he can’t look at her and Ry at the same time, so he just presses his back to the back of his seat and tries to figure out where to look. “You smell like a lot of panic right now, and I’m not great with humans, but I know that that’s bad. I want you to try to breathe.”

Stiles puts his head down against his knees, because then he can’t see anything, and it feels good, and he just wants—he just wants his mom and dad, he just wants his mom and dad, he just wants his mom and dad.

\--

Stiles ends up on a couch that smells only a little bit like smoke and a lot like Febreze, Derek next to him. He puts his arm around Stiles, and Stiles curls up around him, and Derek is shaking a little, or trembling, or making sad little noises that seem to be coming from his throat and his chest and his whole body. Stiles feels like that too, like he’s going to shake apart, like Derek’s arm is the only thing holding him together.

But Derek doesn’t have an arm to hold him together, and Stiles’s arms aren’t long enough, so instead he says, “You’re sad. Why are you sad?”

Derek makes a noise like he was hit. That makes Stiles feel bad. He doesn’t want to hurt Derek. Then Derek says, “I did something bad.”

“Oh.” Stiles thinks about that for a minute. “My mom always said it’s okay as long as you say you’re sorry and nobody got hurt.”

Derek touches Stiles’s hair. “People got hurt.”

That makes it more complicated. Stiles tries to think about what his mom would say. “I think—I think if you’re sorry, and you say you’re sorry, and you tell the people you’re sorry, it’s okay. Like when I pushed Scott and he fell and he had an asthma attack and he had to go to the hospital, but I said sorry and he said it was okay because I didn’t mean it. Unless you meant it.”

“No, I didn’t mean it.” Derek’s voice shakes a little. “I would never mean it.”

“Okay. Then it’s okay, I think.” Stiles’s mom was better at this than he is, and he’s mostly just trying to think about what she would say. “Maybe your mom would know. Your mom seems like she knows lots of things.”

“My mom does know lots of things.” Derek’s hand tightens on his shoulder, but not a hurting tight, just a tight tight. “She’ll be mad if I tell her, though, because I broke one of her rules.”

Stiles thinks about that for a second. It’s like a puzzle, he thinks, trying to work out what his mom would suggest. “But you still broke the rule even if you don’t tell her. So telling her won’t make the rule more broken, right? And if you say you’re sorry, she might not be mad, because sometimes people do bad things by accident and then say they’re sorry and it’s okay because they didn’t mean to do it and just forgot.”

“You’re a smart kid,” Derek says.

Stiles shrugs. “I’m just trying to think about what my mom would say.” Then he remembers that his mom won’t be able to say those things anymore, because she’s dead, and something tightens in his chest, and he pulls his knees up to his chest. It’s hard to breathe, and his head hurts, and he presses his forehead to his knees. The pressure helps a little.

His hands hurt.

Derek pulls him close, and Stiles tips over sideways against him. Derek makes a soft growling rumble that vibrates through Stiles and makes his whole body shake.

“I’m sorry,” Derek says quietly. “I wish I knew how to help you.”

Stiles is crying, he can feel the wetness on the collar of his shirt, and he jams his head more against his knees, and he just wants to go home. He wants to go home.

\--

He meets everyone who’s at the house at dinner, and it’s a quiet meal, and Stiles isn’t—

He meets everyone, Mia and Alain who are Ry’s younger siblings, and twins, and he meets Cora who is Derek and Laura’s younger sister, and Mr. Hale is still at the hospital and Stiles doesn’t ask where Mia and Alain and Ry’s mom is.

Mrs. Hale sits at the head of the table, and nobody sits at the other head, and there are empty chairs, and people put food on Stiles’s plate, and he guesses he eats it because at some point it’s gone.

He feels empty, like a melon that someone hollowed out and then put back together, like that video of someone putting a hole in a watermelon and putting a drill inside and turning it on and then pouring all of the watermelon out afterwards. The food doesn’t make him feel more full.

Mia and Alain are sitting closest to Stiles, and they’re talking about school and hoping their dad is okay and how weird the house smells, and Stiles just wants to climb under the table and put his hands over his ears and not listen to them anymore, because they have a dad and they have a house and Stiles doesn’t know if he can go home again, and he doesn’t want to cry again.

At some point Laura walks over and puts her hand on the back of his neck, and Stiles presses his lips together and shoves his hand against his mouth because he’s going to cry or maybe throw up.

“It’s okay,” Laura says.

Stiles shakes his head, because it’s _not_ okay, it’s _not_ , and his hands hurt, and everything smells like smoke and air freshener, and everything is too bright and loud, and everyone is staring at him like he’s a freak.

\--

Stiles is put in a room with Ry to sleep that night, and he lays in bed for a while until it feels like everyone in the house is asleep. But he can’t sleep, and the house smells like smoke, and he wants to go home, so he gets up and thinks  _I don’t want anyone to wake up_  really hard and then walks through the house and outside and through the forest to his house.

He’s tired when he gets home, and his leg hurts, and there’s police tape all around it, but the tape isn’t that low, so he just ducks under it and walks up to his house. He doesn’t have a key, though, so he just sits down in front of the door and pulls his knees up to his chest and thinks that he misses his mom and his dad.


	3. Chapter 3

Mrs. Hale finds Stiles sitting there, and she sits down next to him, stretching her legs out in front of her. Stiles pulls his knees tighter against his chest.

“We were worried that you weren’t still at the house,” she says.

Stiles swallows. “I wanted to go home.”

“I know,” she tells him, and she sounds like she does know. “But it’s our job to look after you now, and we can’t do that if we don’t know where you are.”

Stiles hunches his shoulders and feels bad that she had to come all the way out here to get him. “My dad used to get mad when I would leave at night. And I was going to go back.”

“Is there some reason you didn’t want to wait until the morning?”

“There’ll be people here during the day, and I couldn’t sleep, and I’m really sorry.”

“I’m not mad at you.” She touches his chin, tilting it up so he has to look at her. “But I need you not to do this again, Stiles. Do you understand?” Stiles nods. “Good. Now can you tell me why nobody heard you leave?”

He shrugs. “I just thought really hard that I didn’t want anyone to wake up. That kept Mom and Dad from waking up, too, and I didn’t know if it would work because some of you are werewolves, but it did.” He pulls his chin away from her hand, and she lets him. “Do we have to go back to your home now?”

“Is there some reason you don’t want to go back?”

Stiles sticks his face in his knees. “This is my house,” he mumbles, “and your house smells like smoke and air freshener, and you have all your family but my family is dead, and this is my _house_.”

“Okay.” Mrs. Hale touches his back, and it feels like she’s trying to be his mom, and he jerks away from her, curling up even more. “Okay, Stiles, we can sit here a little longer.”

Both of his hands hurt, those weird different hurts, and his leg aches, and he kind of wants to cry, but he’s sick of wanting to cry, and he just wants to not be here right now. He wants to not _be_ right now.

Finally, he stands up, and Mrs. Hale stands up with him, and they walk back through the forest to the Hale House. Stiles’s leg hurts and hurts and hurts, but he doesn’t say anything, and Mrs. Hale doesn’t say anything, and Stiles wonders if she’s sad too.

Finally, he asks, “Are you sad about your brother?”

Mrs. Hale looks down at him. “Why do you ask that?”

Stiles looks down at his feet, shrugging. “I don’t know. Your brother was hurt but you have to be here with us.”

She stares at him for a minute, and he shoves his hands in his pockets and hopes she’s not mad at him. Finally, she says, “It is hard for me not to be with Peter right now, particularly because he’s injured and in pain. But I always find it difficult when my pack is separated. As the Alpha, I have the strongest tie to each of them, and so feel the strain most strongly.”

“Huh.” Stiles thinks about that for a second. “Why are you Alpha?”

Mrs. Hale laughs. “That’s a very complicated question, Stiles. The short answer is that I’m the Alpha because I have the strongest tie to the pack.”

Stiles squints at her, then trips over a root and almost falls over. “That’s—” He tries to think of the word for when answers go around and around like that. “Recursive,” he settles on finally.

“You’re right. The way that it works is that there are some people who are closer to being the Alpha than others. They’re more in charge. One of the people like that is the heir, the person who will take over after the Alpha dies. I was the heir before my father died.”

“Can a human become an Alpha?”

“No,” Mrs. Hale tells him, “they can’t.”

Stiles doesn’t like that much. “That’s not fair.”

“It isn’t, is it?” They come out of the forest near the house, and there’s a wolf there. Mrs. Hale walks up to the wolf and scratches it on the head. “Thank you, Laura, for keeping watching. I’ll patrol now. Can you walk Stiles back to the house?”

The wolf nods, then walks over and nudges Stiles’s leg. It’s the hurt leg, though, and he sucks in a breath and stumbles a little. Mrs. Hale looks over at him. “Are you okay?”

Stiles nods, but his leg really does hurt, so he says, “My leg hurts.”

Laura leans up against his leg and nudges herself under his hand, and then the pain fades away from his body like it’s being sucked out through his hand. He ruffles Laura’s fur in thanks.

Mrs. Hale walks over to him and says, “I want you to tell us when you hurt. We have pain medication that humans can take, and we can help you. But I don’t want you to be in pain.”

Stiles shrugs, because it’s stupid and doesn’t really matter, and her brother is in the hospital and Mr. Hale was shot and Ry was burned and so Stiles’s stupid hands and his stupid leg don’t matter.

They walk up to the house and then up to Ry’s room, and Ry rolls over and looks at him but doesn’t say anything, and Stiles pushes off his shoes and curls up on his bed and tries to fall asleep. Laura nudges his shoulder with her nose, then pads away.

\--

Stiles is eating eggs and bacon—they go through a lot of meat at the Hales, he thinks—when Mrs. Hale says, “Ry, can you look after Stiles for a little bit?”

Ry nods, swallowing his mouthful of eggs to say, “Sure, Aunt Talia. Should we go out and help with some of the rebuilding once we’re done?”

She shakes her head. “I don’t think Stiles needs to work on that right now. For right now, just finish eating, and this shouldn’t be much longer than this.” She looks at Stiles, who is trying to figure out how to use his fork to draw a werewolf face in his eggs. They’re not cooperating. Eggs are too lumpy. “Stiles, I just need to talk to Derek for a little while, but Ry will look after you in the meantime. Try to finish your food.”

Stiles nods. Maybe if Derek talks to Mrs. Hale then he won’t feel bad anymore.

Mrs. Hale leaves, and Ry says, “You really should eat your food, you know.”

Stiles shrugs and eats some more eggs. They taste like egg. He misses his mom’s pancakes. He’s not sure if werewolves eat pancakes. “Do werewolves eat pancakes?”

Ry frowns at him. “I—yes, werewolves eat pancakes. Did someone say they didn’t, or you wouldn’t be able to?”

Stiles shakes his head. “My mom used to make pancakes before she started forgetting everything, like how to make pancakes. I miss pancakes.”

“Oh,” Ry says. “Well, we can make pancakes. I’m sure we have a recipe around here somewhere.”

Stiles should have thought of that before. He stands up. “I know how to make my mom’s pancakes.” He had learned the recipe when his mom started forgetting so he could show it to her again so she wouldn’t forget but she forgot again anyway.”

Ry stands up too. “Why won’t we make pancakes tomorrow? You already have food now, and if we make them tomorrow, more people can enjoy them.”

Stiles thinks about that for a second, but it makes sense, so he sits back down. He picks up a piece of bacon with his fingers and jams it in his mouth. “Okay,” he says around the bacon. “I think there’s someone at the door.”

“How do you—” Ry starts to say, and then there’s a knock at the door. He frowns, then says, “I need to go get that.”

Stiles stands up, stuffing the rest of the bacon in his mouth. He wipes his hands on his pants. “Okay.”

He follows Ry to the door, and then Ry opens it and frowns and says, very quietly, “Fuck.”

Stiles’s dad said that once and then said that it was an adult word and that Stiles wasn’t supposed to use it, so Stiles doesn’t say anything because he’s not sure if Ry is an adult and doesn’t want to get him in trouble if he wasn’t supposed to use an adult word. Then Ry says, “Hello, Duecalion. Is Aunt Talia expecting you?”

The man looks at Ry, then at Stiles, then says, “This is the little ashbreaker, isn’t it?”

Ry says, “Aunt Talia is busy at the moment, so I can’t let you in right now.” The man’s eyes glow red, like how Mrs. Hale’s do, but Stiles is pretty sure this man is scarier than Mrs. Hale. “If you’ll wait out here, I’ll go let her know that you’re here.”

Then he closes the door, and Stiles looks at it and thinks really hard,  _I hope he can’t get in_.

Next to him, Ry says, “Fuck,” again.”

Stiles looks at him. “Are you allowed to say adult words?”

Ry jumps then grins at Stiles, looking like when Stiles’s dad was kissing Stiles’s mom and then Stiles walked in. “Not in front of Aunt Talia—or you, so please don’t tell her I said that.”

Ry is nice, so Stiles nods and says, “Okay.”

Ry looks at the door. “If he’s here—”

Stiles thinks about telling him about thinking really hard that he doesn’t want the man to be able to get in, but he thinks Ry will think that that’s stupid, and he doesn’t want Ry to think that he’s stupid, so he doesn’t say anything.

Instead, Ry walks through the house, and he stops in front of a room that has a whirring noise coming out of it, and knocks, and says, “Aunt Talia, Deucalion’s outside.”

After a second, the whirring noise stops and the door opens and Mrs. Hale says, “Deucalion is here, now?”

“I didn’t invite him in,” Ry says. “He saw Stiles, though, and called him an ashbreaker.”

Mrs. Hale looks like she wants to say adult words, but instead she growls and says, “I’ll deal with him.”

She steps between Stiles and Ry and heads back towards the door, and Stiles follows her and thinks, I hope she doesn’t get mad at me for following her, and when she opens the door the man says, “Talia, so good to see you.”

“Now isn’t a good time, Deucalion, unless you somehow missed the fact that we’re in the middle of rebuilding our house.”

Deucalion growls and tries to walk into the house, but then he stops and growls louder. “You ashed the entrance to your own house?”

Mrs. Hale freezes, and then she steps out of the house, past Deucalion, and says, “Of course not.”

“Then why can’t I—”

Mrs. Hale turns and looks at him, and her eyes glow red, and so do Deucalion’s, and now she looks scary too. “I suggest you leave. If this is about Pack Alliance matters, you’re welcome to contact me the usual way, instead of barging into my territory without permission.”

Deucalion growls again and then walks away, and Mrs. Hale turns towards the house and then goes very still when she sees Stiles. “Stiles? When did you—I didn’t know you were there.”

Stiles shrugs. “I followed you.”

She frowns, then walks into the house and closes the door behind her. Then she says, “Stiles this is really important. Do you know why Deucalion couldn’t walk into the house?”

Stiles doesn’t want to say it, but she said it’s important, so he says, “I thought really hard that I didn’t want him to get in, because Ry didn’t want him in here.”

“Is this like when you left the house and nobody noticed?”

Stiles shrugs. “I guess.”

“Do you know how that works?”

Stiles shrugs again. “Sometimes when I think really hard about something, it happens. But not everything. I tried to fix my mom’s brain, but even though I kept thinking about it, her brain didn’t get better. I tried,” he tells her, because he wants to make sure she doesn’t think he didn’t try to fix his mom. “I really did try, and I thought really hard about it, but I think I don’t know how brains work, and I tried reading the encyclopedia, but I guess it doesn’t matter now, because someone shot her.”

“Oh,” Mrs. Hale says. “Oh, Stiles.” She crouches down in front of Stiles. “Not being able to fix your mom, that wasn’t your fault.”

Stiles lifts one shoulder, then drops it. “If I had had more time, I might have been able to read more about brains, but even then I might not have been able to fix it, because it’s hard to hope really hard for brain things. But it was my mom.”

“Of course,” she says. “Dr. Deaton is going to be coming in a couple days,” she tells him. “Dr. Deaton is the vet, but he can also do some things a little like what you can do, I think. Would you be okay talking to him?”

Stiles thinks about it. “Does that mean I’m a wizard?”

She laughs, standing up. “I don’t know. But Dr. Deaton might. What do you think?”

“Okay. But I’m making pancakes tomorrow. It has to be after pancakes.”

She nods. “Deal. After pancakes.” She reaches out and ruffles his hair. “I need to go back and talk to Derek now. Are you going to be okay?”

Stiles nods too. “I’m fine. Do you want me to help you with your house?” Sometimes when he’s at Scott’s, he helps Scott do his chores. And he doesn’t mind, because he likes to feel helpful. Though he would rather be playing video games with Scott, but Scott isn’t here and he doesn’t know when he’ll get to see Scott, and he doesn’t have anything to do but sit and be sad, and he doesn’t want to sit and be sad.

Mrs. Hale stares at him for a minute, then says, “If you want, you can help with painting. But don’t feel like you need to. Do you get that? You don’t need to help paint the house right now to be able to stay.”

Stiles nods. “You, I know.” He doesn’t know what painting the house would have to do with staying at the Hale house.

“Good.” She ruffles his hair. “Thank you, Stiles, for talking to me. And for keeping Deucalion out of the house.”

“Ry seemed scared.”

“And you made the right decision. If you or someone else here is scared, particularly one of the other humans, you should always do what you can to protect yourself.”

Stiles squints up at her. “Are humans better at telling what they should be scared of?”

“Well, it’s easier for humans to be hurt than for werewolves. So they need to be more careful.”

“But it was humans who set your house on fire, right? And you’re werewolves?”

Mrs. Hale stares at him for a really long time, until he thinks he said something wrong, which he does sometimes without noticing, and then she smiles and nods and says, “You’re right. Why don’t you go find Ry now, so I can go talk to Derek.”

Stiles goes and finds Ry, who gives him a hug. It feels weird, because older kids don’t give hugs, but maybe he feels like he needs to hold on to someone, so Stiles will let him hold on to him. But it feels nice, too.


	4. Chapter 4

Stiles wakes up the next morning ready to make pancakes, and it’s really early and not a lot of people are awake, so he starts wandering around the kitchen trying to find all the things he needs to make pancakes, like flour and sugar and eggs. He thinks that the recipe he knows is for four people, and there are more than four people who live there, so he thinks he’ll have to make more than one recipe.

He knows his mom would do all the math and double all the ingredients, but some of the ingredients have fractions, and he’s not sure how to do multiplying fractions, so he thinks he can just make one recipe and then make another recipe and then it’s the same as doubling the recipe because he’ll have two recipes.

When he turns around from trying to find big bowls, Mrs. Hale is standing in the doorway to the kitchen, and Stiles jumps and almost drops the cup measure he’s holding.

She smiles at him. “What are you doing, Stiles?”

“I’m making pancakes.” He looks at the counter, where he has most of the ingredients and things he needs. “I’m going to make pancakes. I don’t have all the things I need to make pancakes, but once I find them I’m going to make pancakes.”

“By yourself?”

Stiles nods. “I know how to make pancakes by myself. I’ll make the pancakes and then you can eat pancakes.”

Mrs. Hale looks like she wants to say something, but then some of the kids show up, Mia and Cora, and then Alain shows up, and Derek, and Derek asks, “Why didn’t I hear you wake up?”

Stiles shrugs, because he doesn’t want to talk about the thinking really hard thing, and then he finds the mixing bowls and pulls them out and puts them on the counter.

“Ooh,” Cora says, “what are we making?”

“I’m making pancakes.”

“Why don’t I help you with that,” Mrs. Hale says, and starts moving towards one of the cupboards, and _no._

Stiles realizes he screamed that when everyone stops and stares at him, but she can’t, she _can’t_ , and he says, “I’m making pancakes, I’m making pancakes by myself.”

“You’re a bit young to try to do all that by myself,” Mrs. Hale says. “Why won’t you let me help you?”

“Because it’s my mom’s pancake recipe,” he yells, “and you’re not my mom.” She keeps staring at him, everyone does, and he doesn’t know why that’s making him even more mad but it is, and he shouts, “This recipe is my mom’s and I learned it for my mom and I’m going to make it and if you make it then it won’t be my mom’s recipe so I’m going to make it myself and then you can eat it but I’m going to be the one to make it because you’re not my _mom_.”

“Okay,” Mrs. Hale says, and her voice is low and calm and Stiles thinks he should feel bad about yelling at her but he’s just so _angry_ , because his mom is gone and nobody is allowed to take this away from him because people already took her away from him. “Okay,” she says again. “Would it count as helping if I show you where things are? You’ve found most of it, but it might make it a little faster if you have someone showing you where things are.”

Stiles thinks about it, then nods. That’s not part of the recipe, and he doesn’t know where things are, and he thinks that’s okay.

“I’m also going to have Derek start making some sausage and eggs,” Mrs. Hale tells him, “because werewolves need to eat a lot of food, and we need to eat meat, and that doesn’t mean we don’t want to eat your pancakes, but we’re going to need other food too.”

Stiles shrugs. He doesn’t care what other food they need to make, or that they’re going to be making it while he’s making pancakes, because his dad would make coffee while he and his mom would make pancakes, and if they need meat then they should eat meat.

It takes him a while to make pancakes, and they’re not all the same size, but Laura compliments him on them and so does Mrs. Hale and Derek and Ry, and he thinks his mom would be happy that he made the pancakes right, and he just wishes she were here because he thinks she would like them too.

Mrs. Hale eventually makes him sit down and eat too, and he eats two pancakes and a thing of sausage, and he kind of wants to throw up, but Derek sits next to him and makes him eat and asks him how the sausages are.

Stiles doesn’t want to lie to him, but Derek looks sad and anxious and kind of like he wants to throw up too, so Stiles says that they’re good.

Derek looks a little less anxious, and then he stands up and starts washing dishes, and nobody else is around but Derek and Stiles wonders if Mrs. Hale told him to watch Stiles.

Laura comes back again at some point, though, and she walks up and wraps her arms around Derek from behind, and Derek drops a plate in the sink but then relaxes all at once like someone pulled all the anxiousness out of him, and Stiles thinks that maybe he’s here to keep an eye on Derek instead of the other way around.

“Mom didn’t tell me,” he hears Laura say, “and I’m not going to ask, but I know something is up, and you can tell me if you want.”

“Someone tried to burn our house down,” Derek says. “Isn’t that enough of a reason for me to be upset?”

“It is, but I know that’s not all of it. Is it because we weren’t inside? That’s not your fault. We couldn’t have known.”

“I should have, though. I should have known.” It looks like Derek tries to pull away from Laura, but she doesn’t let him. Stiles thinks he should leave, but maybe he’s not supposed to, and he doesn’t know where he would go.

“Oh, Derek.” Laura sighs. “We’re not magic; we can’t see the future. It’s not your fault for not seeing this coming. None of us could have.”

Derek jerks away from Laura, backing away from her. His eyes are glowing yellow, and it looks like he has fangs. “It’s my fucking fault, Laura, so I should have fucking seen it coming. She got in because I _let_ her in, and I should have known better, but so many people are hurt and Uncle Peter is burned, and the kid’s an orphan now, and it’s all because of me.”

Stiles flinches, but nobody is paying any attention to him.

“Who?” Laura asks. “Who did you let in?” Derek turns his face away, but then Laura’s eyes glow yellow too, and she demands, “Who did you let in, Derek?”

“Kate Argent.”

Laura’s the one who flinches now, catching herself on the side of the sink. Derek looks like he wants to cry, and Stiles feels like he wants to cry, and everything hurts.

“Why?”

Derek makes a hurt noise, then turns and runs out of the room, and Laura looks like she’s going to go after him and maybe hurt him, because her eyes are yellow and she has fangs, and so Stiles stands up and goes in between them and says, “He said he felt bad, and he didn’t meant to do it, and he didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt, and please don’t go and hurt him.”

Laura stares above him, past him, and then she tilts his head down towards him, but her eyes are still up. And then, finally, she looks down at him and says, “I’m not going to hurt Derek. I wouldn’t hurt him.” She frowns. “Do he tell you what happened?”

Stiles shakes his head. “He just said that he did something bad and that he didn’t mean to hurt anyone.” Stiles looks down at his hands, which have bandages on them still. “Is Kate Argent the person that I shot?”

Laura flinches, then says, “I think you should talk to mom about that” She drags her hand over her face, looking past Stiles again. He thinks she’s still mad at Derek. “Kate Argent. Fuck.”

\--

It doesn’t rain the during Stiles’s parents’ funeral. He kind of thinks it should rain, like in movies, like the sky is crying and so that’s how you know it’s sad, but he doesn’t want to stand out in the rain. His parents are buried next to each other, or at least boxes that everyone says have his parents are buried next to each other, and people talk about how nice his parents were, and the police do something, and they talk, and someone sings, and Stiles  _doesn’t care_.

He should, he should care, he should something, but his mom and dad are gone and none of any of this matters, because it’s not going to bring them back.

Scott sits on one side of him, and Mrs. Hale sits on the other side, and at some point they fold up a flag into a triangle like Stiles has seen in those movies about military people, and Officer Richards crouches down in front of Stiles and hands him the flag.

Stiles doesn’t know what to do with it, because it’s just a flag, so he just sticks it on his lap. Officer Richards touches his hair then stands and walks away.

When the funeral is over, people start talking to each other, and Mrs. Hale gets up, but Stiles doesn’t. His parents are buried here, now, and he thinks he doesn’t want to leave them alone. What if something happens to them?

Scott grabs his hand and says, “Even if you’re living with the Hales, you’re still my brother.”

Stiles looks down at the flag in his lap. There’s water on it, like it’s raining, but it’s not raining. “I think I killed someone.”

“Oh,” Scott says, then is quiet for a while. Stiles closes his eyes. He’s crying. He wants his mom and his dad, but they’re stuck in the ground, and dead, and all Stiles has is this stupid flag. “Why?” Scott asks finally.

Stiles shrugs. “The house was on fire, and they had a gun, and then I had the gun, and I think I killed them.”

“Oh,” Scott says again. He keeps holding Stiles’s hand. “You’re like your dad. You stopped a bad person.”

“What if they put me in jail?”

Scott thinks about that for a minute. “There are a lot of police here, right? If they were going to put you in jail, wouldn’t they have done it?”

That sounds like it could be right. Stiles opens his eyes. Mrs. Hale is talking to Scott’s mom. Stiles’s hands hurt. “How long do you think the Hales are going to keep me for?”

Scott shrugs. “I don’t know. But maybe after that you can live with me. I’ll ask my mom.” Stiles nods. He likes that. “When are you coming back to school?”

“I don’t know.” Mrs. Hale and Scott’s mom walk over to them, and Stiles asks, “Mrs. Hale, when am I going back to school?”

She looks surprised, then says, “We can figure that out. You don’t need to worry about that right now.”

“But if he doesn’t go back to school then I can’t see him,” Scott says, gripping Stiles’s hand tighter. It hurts a little, but that’s okay, because it hurt anyway, and Stiles likes holding Scott’s hand, even if Jackson says that makes them gay.

“Why don’t we give Stiles a little bit of time,” Scott’s mom says. “It’s really scary to lose both of your parents, and he might need some time before he’s ready to go back to school.”

“And you can come visit him,” Mrs. Hale adds. “Just call me, and we can figure it out.” She looks at Scott’s mom. “I don’t want to isolate him, particularly not now.” She looks at Stiles again. “Do you want to go?”

Before Stiles can say anything, he hears someone say, “I don’t see why he should be going with those animals. A lot of good families would take in the Sheriff’s kid.”

“Mikhail was saying,” another person says, “that he was the one who saved them when their house was on fire, and they want to keep him as some sort of insurance policy in case it happens again.”

Mrs. Hale starts to move, but then Scott’s mom walks over to the people and says, “You can believe whatever bigoted nonsense you want inside your own head, but don’t make Stiles listen to it.”

They all look over at Stiles and Scott and Mrs. Hale, and then the people walk away, and Scott’s mom walks back over to them. Mrs. Hale nods at her. “Your defense is unnecessary but appreciated.”

Scott’s mom looks at Stiles. “I would defend you, Talia, regardless, but this isn’t about you. I don’t want Stiles to think that you’re only taking him in to use him.” She crouches down in front of Stiles, putting one hand on his hand. Scott is staring at her with big eyes. “If you ever think that Mrs. Hale or any of the Hales are using you, or are mistreating you, or there’s anything wrong, you can tell me. I don’t care if you think it’s silly, or doesn’t mean anything. Especially if they start acting like Scott’s dad. I’ll make sure you’re safe.”

“But they’re werewolves,” Stiles says blankly. Werewolves aren’t like Scott’s dad. They’re  _werewolves_.

“I don’t care if they’re the President of the United States,” Scott’s mom says, and looks back at Mrs. Hale.

Stiles isn’t sure what that means, and after a minute he says, “I don’t think any of the Hales are going to become President of the United States.”

Scott’s mom starts laughing, looking startled, then says, “Talia—Mrs. Hale might.”

Mrs. Hale shakes her head. “Never. I am never doing that.” She looks at Stiles, who’s clutching the triangle flag because he needs to hold on to something. “Are you ready to go, Stiles?”

Stiles looks at Scott, because he doesn’t want to leave him, because it’s been so long since he’s seen him, and seeing him makes everything feel better, and Scott throws his arms around Stiles and says into his ear, “You’re not bad, I promise.”

A noise comes from Stiles’s throat like when Derek told Laura about the thing that he did, and Stiles starts crying again, but if Scott says he’s not a bad person then he’s not a bad person because Scott is the most good person that Stiles knows, and he wouldn’t lie to Stiles, not about anything, and Stiles would ask his dad but his dad is gone, and everything hurts like he just slept on the floor curled up tight and stiff like he was scared, and he’s scared and angry and so so empty.

He wants his mom and dad back, and he knows they’re never coming back, and it hurts.

\--

Mr. Hale is at the Hale house after the funeral, painting the outside of the house, but he stops when Mrs. Hale drives them up to the house. Mrs. Hale gets out of the car and walks over to him, and Stiles gets out too, holding the flag triangle to his chest. Mr. Hale gives Mrs. Hale a kiss then looks at Stiles. Stiles recognizes him from that one time that he met him when he was with his mom.

Mr. Hale walks over to him and says, “Hello, Stiles. My name is Roger Hale.”

Stiles nods. “Is Ry’s dad okay? They said you were with him in the hospital.”

Mr. Hale looks surprised, and then he says, “Peter was burned, but he’s getting better now. It just takes werewolves longer to heal from fire than from other things.”

“Did you leave him alone, if you’re here now?”

“Laura and Ry are with him now,” Mrs. Hale says. “We need to make sure there’s always at least one werewolf with him, in case something goes wrong.”

“But I wanted to meet you,” Mr. Hale says, “because I heard you’ll be staying with us.” He reaches out and touches Stiles’s hair, like the cop had. “How are you feeling?” Stiles shrugs. He’s not really sure how he’s feeling. “That’s okay. Sometimes when we get scared or confused, or a lot of things change at once, it’s hard to tell what we’re feeling. But you can tell us what you’re feeling, even if you don’t think we’re going to like it.”

Stiles thinks about it, then remembers what Scott’s mom had said and says, “I think Mrs. McCall thinks you’re going to become the president.”

Mr. Hale looks at Mrs. Hale, who sighs and smiles and says, “She was telling Stiles that, if he needed her to, she would defy us to help him, and that she didn’t care if we were werewolves, or even the President of the United States.”

“Ah.” Mr. Hale smiles and looks at Stiles again. “If anyone’s going to become president, it’ll be Talia. Mrs. Hale.”

Stiles considers that, then shrugs. “Lydia wants to be president, I think. She said she’s going to be the first girl president, but if Mrs. Hale is president then I guess Lydia could be the second girl president.”

“That sounds good,” Mr. Hale says.

At the same time, Mrs. Hale says, “I don’t want to be President.” She looks at Stiles. “Why don’t you go put that inside and then go see if Derek can give you a snack from the kitchen. You can tell him I said you were allowed one.”

Stiles nods, then heads inside. He puts the flag down on the bed he’s been sleeping in, because he’s not sure where it goes, then goes to find Derek.

Derek is sitting on the floor of the living room, shoving into a corner like he’s trying to make myself as small as possible or maybe teleport into another room, and he looks sad. Stiles is sad, too, so he sits down next to Derek, who puts an arm around him.

“If an adult tries to touch you,” Derek says finally, hoarsely, after they’ve been sitting there for a while, “and you don’t want it, or it seems wrong, or they say you love them so you need to touch them back, and you can’t tell anyone else, and you need to tell them things, things they’re not supposed to know, don’t listen to them. Tell me and I’ll rip their throat out.”

Stiles thinks about that for a minute, then nods. “Okay.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tada, it's finished. The next part to go up will probably be Stiles and Deaton, unless I decide to write some other part of it. At some point I will also almost definitely write Peter coming home, and I'll probably write Stiles meeting the Nemeton.

**Author's Note:**

> This is chronologically the beginning of Grace to Your Children, and I've actually finished writing this part. I'll post about a chapter a day. The other parts will more or less be in chronological order, but I won't be sticking strictly to that.


End file.
